Why This Matters

Monday, March 27

It appears this Internet thing is here to stay. The Online Media, Marketing & Advertising (OMMA) Conference goes down at the Hilton Universal City in Los Angeles. Internet 2006 is the theme, and speakers include ABC Television Executive VP of Digital Media Albert Cheng and Deutsch L.A. President Eric Hirshberg. Across town, the Digital Hollywood confab kicks off at the Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel, where Generate founder Jordan Levin and TV Guide Channel President Ryan O'Hara will be among the dispersers of intellectual capital. Showing that we haven't yet hit the tipping point for conferences focused on broadband video, one panel is titled “The Broadband Video Tipping Point: Availability of Vast Content and Portability.” In New York, former Squeeze frontman Glenn Tilbrook performs at the VH1 Classic studio. Cocktails will be served, though asking the waitress for black coffee in bed is only funny the first time.

Tuesday, March 28

Court TV holds court at Eleven Madison Park in New York for its Upfront Press Lunch, with CEO Henry Schleiff and President Art Bell. Out in the Nevada desert, a dozen robots race 130 miles for a $2 million jackpot. Nova's The Great Robot Race, the Pentagon-sponsored, driver-less vehicle contest (think Cannonball Run without Burt Reynolds, Dom DeLuise or Bert Convy), premieres on PBS at 8 p.m. ET. And long before there was Bob the Builder, there was another Bob the builder—as in hirsute handyman Bob Vila. Today marks the release of the four-DVD set Storm-Ready Design Project: Punta Gorda, Florida, which documents the rebuild of a home wrecked by Hurricane Charley.

Wednesday, March 29

The Weather Channel blows into New York for its “Wine & Weather” upfront event at the Chemist Club. Network personalities Stephanie Abrams, Jim Cantore and Dr. Heidi Cullen will be there rain or shine. A forecaster of another sort gets her day in the sun at Sci Fi, as Psychic at Large, starring soothsayer Char Margolis, premieres at 10 p.m. Perhaps Margolis knows who will be nominated for the Sports Emmy Awards, but the rest of us will have to wait until they're announced at the World Congress of Sports at the Pierre in New York.

Thursday, March 30

The most successful women in TV discuss their experiences at the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' Goldenson Theater in Hollywood. Panelists include Kyra Sedgwick from The Closer and Melina Kanakaredes from CSI: NY, and Angela Lansbury is the guest of honor. SkiTAM 2006 hits Vail, Colo., as CTAM members root on the U.S. Paralympic ski team, and “a thousand movers and shakers of the conservative movement” say mean things about the left at the Media Research Center's 2006 Gala at the Grand Hyatt in Washington.

Friday, March 31

Adam West's Batman costume. Indiana Jones' Holy Grail. Uncle Fester's iron-maiden contraption. These and 500-plus other showbiz sundries will be auctioned off at the Profiles in History gallery in Beverly Hills. Perhaps a few decades from now, you'll be able to buy Andy Milonakis' red flannel shirt at such an auction. The baby-faced oddball debuts a new season of his quirky (and by quirky, we mean truly freaky) Andy Milonakis Show on MTV2 (9 p.m.).—Michael Malone